Friday, December 13, 2013

Rows Garden grid, in case you wondered. Clues for answers in Rows, clues for answers running clockwise or counterclockwise in white, medium, and dark “Blooms.”

Are you a fan of Rows Garden puzzles? Do you find that the frequency with which you encounter Rows Garden puzzles (occasionally in the Saturday Wall Street Journal, occasionally but quite possibly as reruns in Games/World of Puzzles) is nowhere near adequate? Then 2014 is your lucky year, because Andrew Ries is resuming making his Rows Garden puzzles. He’ll make a new one every two weeks, available via email subscription. Name your own price (no, really). And choose your own difficulty level—each puzzle will be delivered in easy and hard versions. Details here.

Gary Cee’s New York Times crossword

NY Times crossword solution, 12 13 13, no. 1213

Mr. Gary Cee has put a lot of fresh fill in this puzzle. Let us regard it, shall we?

44a. [Apex], VERY TOP. Now, this time, I sort of want an article, and also an preposition. AT THE VERY TOP—yes? no?

48a. [Singular publication], ONE-OFF. Such as a special magazine issue dedicated to a celebrity who just died.

52a. [Line near the end of an infomercial], “HERE’S HOW TO ORDER.” I always like the largest number of “easy payments” that they can offer. “Really? Just four easy payments of $19.99 (plus shipping and handling)? That is only, like, forty bucks, isn’t it?”

Anagrams of the word “population” are the order of the day. Let’s see if a case of triskaidekaphobia doesn’t bring any bad mojo to our solving experience.

CrosSynergy / Washington Post crossword solution – 12/13/13

[Post-larval moisturizer?] was PUPA LOTION – I never realized that pupae suffered from dry “skin.” In reading about pupal mating, I ran across the word sphragis, which I’m vowing to include in my next puzzle.

[Visionary pork-barreler?] clued UTOPIAN POL – I doubt there are many utopian pols, at least here in the US. I think most just settle for small victories for their constituents, probably not what motivated them to run in the first place.

[Discretionary increase?] clued OPTIONAL UP – hmmm, moving on.

[Baldwin on a demoted rock?] was not actor Billy or Alec, but PLUTO PIANO – poor Pluto, now designated as one of the 40 or so “dwarf planets” in our Solar System. Perhaps being the only other heavenly body with a Baldwin Piano is some consolation.

Odd theme, with rather tortured theme phrases, but Bob was up to his high standard in cluing the rest of the fill. I enjoy seeing two adjoining entries with similar clues; e.g., [The King’s Mississippi birthplace] next to [Nat King Cole’s birthplace] and [Sound at a spa] by [Sound at a séance]. Then there are clues such as [Cause of cold feet?] for ICEBATH, [Ripple-effect victim?] for WINO (“ripple” is a type of cheap wine) and [Juju, mojo, or grigri] for AMULET which are fun. Finally, we have alliterative clues like [Bitty bark] for YIP and [Reggae’s roots] for SKA. I do have two questions, though, is there a particular reason [Participated in a three-legged event] was the more generic RACED other than to align the clue with [Four-legged event?] for RELAY? And also, how do feel about the indefinite article leading A GONER for [Done for]? I find it a bit arbitrary.

It’s so neat the way the five species of salmon form symmetrical pairs and a middle entry. The way the answers visually reflect the revealer of SALMON/SWIMMING/UPSTREAM is also extremely satisfying. This is such a beautiful, simple and elegant theme! The four salmon, written normally, are CHUM, CHINOOK, SOCKEYE, COHO and STEELHEAD.

It’s an unusual grid design: two black squares in the top-right and bottom-left corners to fit in the four letter salmon. Then the middle is wide open with mostly single and a few double black-squares making for an unusually flowing grid. The flow seems especially curious for a collaboration. Normally constructors try and find a way to divide the grid in two to allow a division of labour? Or is that just me?

The puzzle started with the gimme of ITSPAT. A not too successful and pretty awful movie that I only watched about 20 minutes of. It was striking enough to stick in my brain though! DAYONE as a [Nonspecific journal opening] is also clever; I was thinking scientific journal for some reason! KNISH, HOMEEC, LINUX, LALAW, MARROW, CHORIZO are further highlights. It’s a sign of a professional grid to have such interesting middle-length answers.

Longish solve time because I had trouble locating my error, which turned out to be misspelling Hong Kong’s neighbor MACAO as MACAU, suggesting that Aristotle wrote about … erm … LUGIC.

Didn’t look at the title, but the structure of the clues (“x debut of 1913″) pointed the way fairly obviously, concluding predictably (for regular readers of this blog, anyway) with 112a [Entertainment debut of 1913] CROSSWORD PUZZLE.

23a. [Musical debut of 1913] THE RITE OF SPRING. Poor clue, in my opinion. “Musical” strongly suggests a Broadway-style show. The famous Paris premiére of Stravinsky’s composition was just as notorious for Nijinsky’s startling balletic choreography as the unfamiliar music. And no, I don’t consider the clue to be a clever misdirection.

34a. [Transportation hub debut of 1913] GRAND CENTRAL. This time my issue is with the answer. It’s “Grand Central Station,” just like it’s “Carnegie Hall” and not “Carnegie.” If the clue had included a “for short,” that’d make it all better. Especially glaring when paralleled with the key theme answer, which conceivably could have been “crossword.” See also, 89d [“Winter’s Tale” author] Mark HELPRIN; the edifice plays a prominent part in the novel, which I’m convinced only appeals to people who aren’t NYC natives.

48a. [Novel debut of 1913] SONS AND LOVERS, by DH Lawrence.

62a. [Household product debut of 1913] BRILLO PADS.

72a. [American magazine debut of 1913] VANITY FAIR.

85a. [Numismatic debut of 1913] BUFFALO NICKEL. Also (coincidentally?) it’s the 100th anniversary of the historic reintroduction of a small herd of bison from the Bronx Zoo to the wild in South Dakota, after the species had been nearly exterminated from its natural habitat.

Not exactly a knock-your-socks-off theme, but something like this was to be expected. Brace yourself for more in this vein. We’ll see how they all shake out.

You know you’ve been doing crosswords too long when there’s no hesitation after reading [Pulsing] before filling in ATHROB without any crossing letters. But then it’s a little much when the same puzzle offers 117a [Excitedly active] ABOILand 5d [Render turbid] ROIL. No comment on A LIE, A LARK, and A FLAC.

Upstate action! 2d [City about 180 miles northwest of New York City] ITHACA, 91a [City about 180 miles northwest of New York City] ELMIRA.

16d [Small constellation] ASTERISM. It’s also the name of a typographical symbol, ⁂, which has various uses.

45d [Corkscrew-shaped pasta] ROTINI. I had FUSILI. And would describe the more tightly coiled ROTINI (which isn’t even a real Italian word) as helical. But perhaps I’m being pastapedantic. You decide. Oh, rotini isn’t there because … you know; so here’s a Wikipedia link.

75d [Dictator’s term, perhaps] LIFE. Reminds me of a great line from a so-so James Bond movie, one with Timothy Dalton. Robert Davi’s drug lord villain ominously says to the Central American dictator, who’s under his sway, “Remember, you’re only president … for life.”

Not thrilled by the crossing of 57a [A’s pitcher Dan] OTERO with 51d [Sawmill ramp] LOGWAY, but at least it was guessable.

No-nonsense theme, perfectly placed in the proper venue. Phrases that end with letters that form the name of an institution of higher learning, circled for your convenience (or annoyance, such as the case may be).

Should I be upset that three of the four have four letter names, or that a different set of three lop off just the first letter of the phrases’ second word while one beheads two? I don’t think so; those inconsistencies feel minor. Overriding them is the consistency that the names don’t coincide exactly with full words.

Bonus fill: 4d [The college life] ACADEME.

Longdowns: MEN AT WORK, Suzanne PLESHETTE, SOCCER MOM, and ANTI-NOISE with the great clue, [Like laws that may be used to combat rackets?]. Good stuff.

18 Responses to Friday, December 13, 2013

NYT: I struggled with this one, but I can see that it’s well done. I took soapstone literally, not knowing of its other meaning, so SNOW JOB was a long time coming. I know the name Perez Hilton but have never read anything of his, so OUTED got a WHA? from me. At one point, I was desperate enough that I convinced myself that you could see lOS angelEs from the Mojave desert. May be if you climb a tall JOSHUA TREE? Actually it was the J in Joshua that gave me SNOW JOB and opened up the neighborhood.

The south went down more easily. And the easiest answer in the puzzle for me is probably one that annoyed many others= ATP. Are people expected to know that?

I did not know the phrase “soft soap” either, nor did I know “reedling”.
IRENA Sendler was one of many Polish heroes during WWII, in a country where a full one third of the inhabitants were killed during the war. I spent a day at the Polish Resistance Museum in Warsaw, and it is one of the best historical museums I have visited.
I think ATP is a fine entry given its significance in the human body.
I used to hate blue cheese, but then I was served a good one with a good ruby port after a meal. Delicious combination.

It took a bit longer for me to say ITSDONE thanks to two early penned in incorrect answers: POW & POND at 25A & D (which also briefly led to WARSAWPACT in the MAGNACARTA slot) and ABIT & BOOLEAN(!) at 1D & 15A. Minor fits were had. HERESHOWTOORDER put me in mind of my beleaguered father, on Christmas Eve, surrounded by the parts of whatever thing my younger brother was to find in the morning, and his “favorite” of these terms, with the emphasis on the first word: “YOU PUT IT TOGETHER!”

If you want to get technical, it’s “Grand Central Terminal.” It was Grand Central Depot when it was build in 1871. The name “Grand Central Station” dates from an expansion in 1899. The current building, called Grand Central Terminal, replaced Grand Central Station in 1913.

pannonica:
I was interested by your question regarding “renege”, as I first heard the term when playing hearts (or possibly euchre, which my Michigander parents liked ). Did some research (anything to avoid actual work) and found the term shares a root with the word “renegade”, coming from the Medieval Latin “renegare”, meaning “to deny strongly”. It began to be used in English as renege in this sense first around 1500, then after a couple of hundred years gained its current generic usage. The specific usage applying to games came later. “Renegare” became “renegado” in Spanish, meaning someone who denied the Catholic faith, which led to renegade.

No, thank you both! Because of that I found a cool site called “The Word Detective” where the site’s founder tracks down the origin of words and phrases. Apparently we weren’t the only ones to wonder about “renege” as someone else had requested that he explain its etymology.

Strictly speaking, you don’t *really* need ATP for muscle contraction, but rather for muscle relaxation. Those recently deceased exhibit rigor mortis because there is no ATP around to mediate release of myosin from actin. But I do appreciate seeing ATP clued in reference to biology.